From Chap-Book: “The Yellow Book”

THE YELLOW BOOK. An Illustrated Quar-
terly. Vol. V. April, 1895. Boston: Cope-
land & Day. $1.50.

There is really little of Mr. Aubrey
Beardsley in this volume. Possibly the
outside cover is his, and a young woman
who reclines on a striped lounge. This wo-
man looks decent, as does the clipped poo-
dle, with frills on his legs, stretched on the
floor, his tail visible between the supports
of a stand. You may, however, still see
Mr. Aubrey Beardsley when he wants to be
repulsive, in the back of the yellow cover—
one of his former minor illustrative night-
mares.

Generally, the prints in the present issue
show a decided improvement over the
former ones. But what are ” Bodley
Heads “? Why Bodley? Because the place
where the publishing shop is situated is
called ” The Bodley Head.” The ” Chrys-
anthemum Girl ” is excellent, a happy
thought—only the girl has attenuated arms.
Mr. Alfred Thornton’s ” Trees ” grow from
the sky downward, or from the earth up-
ward, according to whether you put the
print upside down or not. ” The Mantel-
piece ” is a horror, a sulky woman with an
ungainly claw. ” The Prodigal Son ” is
charming and quaintly humorous. ” The
Portrait of a Girl ” has a nice head, with
geometrical legs and feet, the triangle of
her dress assorting itself to her circular
hoop. It is a study of animated conic
sections, so to speak. There is one absolute-
ly absurd print, the silliest attempt at
sketching—probably the picture of a little
girl and her little doll, drawn certainly by
the doll.

The text of ” The Yellow Book ” is varied.
Mr. William Watson’s opening poem,
” Hymn to the Sea, ” has two extraordinary
lines in it:

Who, from the commune of air, cages the
    volatile song ;
Here to capture and prison some fugitive
    breath of thy descant.

Mr. H. D. Trail’s ” The Paper of Basil
Fillmer ” is quite meaningless, and Mr.
Henry Harland‘s ” Rosemary for Remem-
brance ” namby-pamby. Mr. G. S. Street
tries to write down Meredith. A fairly neat
paper is Mr. Maurice Baring’s critique on
Anatole France. There is, too, an original
story of M. Anatole France, entitled
” L’Evèche de Tourcoing, ” which shows
how the Abbé Gruitrel, through the conniv-
ing of the Prefect, was likely to become a
Bishop. The text of ” The Yellow Book, “
though not amusing, is less colored, say,
with a jaundice yellow, than are former
issues of this nondescript series.